As used herein, the term “public terminal” means any computer, electronic interface or station, display, or like terminal that is available for temporary use by a relatively large group of individuals or users, such as the general public. Examples, of public terminals include, without limitation, public use Internet computer stations, electronic ticket booths, information or advertising displays, kiosks, ATM machines, electronic ordering stations, or any other electronic or computer based terminal or display that enables an individual to access some type of content and/or make an electronic transaction.
It is known to require an individual to first verify their identity before access is granted to a computer network or like private content via a publicly available computer terminal. Typical security approaches used on some terminals include the entry of usernames and/or passwords, swiping of magnetically-encoded cards or radio frequency identification tags adjacent a reader, or input of physical biometric data. An advantage of the use of biometrics, such as fingerprints, voice, hand geometric patterns, face geometric pattern, retinal patterns, etc., is that unlike usernames, passwords, cards and tags, biometrics cannot be shared or lost and are not easily stolen or duplicated. The use of biometric data is also convenient to the end user since they cannot be forgotten.
However, biometric identification is typically not used on terminals that are accessed by the general public or other large groups. This is because a large database potentially containing millions of possible candidates would need to be searched every time a single fingerprint or like biometric is input by a user. This requirement for such an extensive search undesirably adds complexity, cost, and an increase in overall transactional time. In addition, such a search is prone to error due to the length of the search and the millions of possible matches. Further, quick access to content or information is typically desired in a public terminal setting thereby rendering the use of biometric security measures impractical when the database of potential users is large.